Pledged To Thee
by corsairr
Summary: Forty-five year old King Alistair reflects on his life and how it went from overwhelmingly adventurous to excruciatingly boring.


Good days did not exist anymore. If he were lucky, the pompous nobles wouldn't complain about petty things like being low on cheese or rats running amok, and the peasants would not come to him asking for free land or free money. In his more vulnerable days, the early days of being a king, he would try to please the entire bunch. He'd give cheap land to a peasant and upset a higher class person for coddling those who work less. He'd give a free loaf of bread to an alienage elf and upset a human.

He learned early on that you could not please everyone, thus he stopped trying to. It didn't take Eamon or a chancellor to figure out the throne in a nutshell: Work on one problem at a time and know not everyone is going to agree with your decisions. A simple enough concept, most days. But on days like this one, the worst days, the ones that made King Alistair resent the Warden's decision to put him on this cursed throne, it seemed like the most complex ideal to manage.

This day being marked as one of the worst had nothing to do with politics, even. Each day had become worse than the last regardless of the events associated with the day. Alistair now sat slumped in his throne, white hair reaching his mid-back, beard falling in long tresses to his chest, eloquent gold crown shining. For two hours he'd sat in this same position, his ankle resting on his knee and his cheek resting on his elbow. A pair of nobles here and there complimented the throne room, along with a few servants and guards.

It was becoming harder for Alistair to believe he once lived a life of adventure, that he once had friends he considered family and a lover he thought he'd be sitting with right now in his old age. Only days filled with excitement did he not wonder where the Warden had gone, and those days no longer existed. He had too much time to think these days.

The quiet murmur that filled the throne room came to a halt when the doors opened. Alistair straightened his posture instinctively as First Enchanter Daylen Amell strode into the room, a band of lower-ranking mages behind him. Alistair had made the Circle separate from the Chantry shortly after becoming king, with a lot of persuasion, taming the riots, and dealing with the backlash of the final decision. He hadn't done it alone, of course. That had been done while the Warden was still at his side.

"First Enchanter," he greeted with his gruff voice, "how are you?"

"Majesty, I have both good and bad news," the mage replied as he approached the throne. "The good news is that the Warden has returned to Ferelden-"

"Where is she?" Alistair interrupted without hesitation. His heart quickened and his shoulders stiffened just at the mention of Lady Aeducan's title. Twenty years since he last saw her. He wondered if she even still remembered his middle name.

Daylen stared at the king with pity. "I'll... let her explain." He turned around and motioned for his fellow mages to step aside, then followed suit.

A small, chubby figure appeared in the doorway. Alistair's lips parted and he leaned forward in his throne, anticipating whatever his eyes would reveal when the figure got close enough for his impaired vision to comprehend. The Maker would be cruel indeed for playing such a vile trick on a desperate old man.

They approached with an easy, hesitant pace. Twelve steps in, Alistair counted, the light illuminated the figure and uncovered a white-haired dwarf that couldn't be mistaken for anyone other than Morwyn even in her elder years. She had the same button nose, deep set eyes, and firm jaw as she did in her younger days. But there was one unmistakable and truly frightening detail about her appearance that Alistair prayed he would never see: She was corrupted.

His heart dropped and he knew then the reason she had come here after all these years. He had hoped she'd came here for a reunion, to reclaim her lost love and spend the rest of her twilight years with him in peace. That had been far-fetched, he supposed. His eyes searched her foggy ones, looking for any semblance of confirmation that this was only one of his many nightmares about this day.

She ceased her steps slowly when she reached the bottom of the staircase, staring up at him with an unreadable expression. "I promised," was all she said, and Alistair knew which promise she spoke of.

He didn't need to know where she'd been all these years or if she found someone else or when she'd started hearing the darkspawn's call. He himself had not yet heard the fatal lullaby, but he was ready. He was mentally drained from the thirty years he'd spent as a king. He wasn't sure how much longer he would have lasted anyway.

So he nodded. Curtly, calmly, with the collected expression only a man who had suffered through things unimaginable, and learned from them, could harness. Without taking his eyes off of hers, he stood up from his throne for the last time and descended the steps.

Morwyn turned around when he reached her and he joined her side. He turned his head to look down at her, trying to put the words he couldn't say into his gaze. She reciprocated the look as easily as she swung her blade, and Alistair knew that she had in fact not found someone else throughout the years.

"One last adventure?" she said quietly, her voice breaking.

He closed his eyes, pained, and gently grasped her hand with his. "One last adventure."


End file.
